1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to fire retardants. More particularly, the present invention relates to air-droppable fire retardants for wildfires.
2. Description of the Related Art
A variety of fire retardant compositions useful to prevent or combat the spread of wildfires have been proposed. Generally such compositions contain a fire retardant salt and aqueous liquid vehicle and various additives including thickeners to improve the aerial drop of fuel coverage characteristics of the composition. Typical among such thickeners are natural and synthetic gums. Commonly used gum-thickened high viscosity fire retardant compositions include ammonium sulfate and monoammonium phosphate and may contain diammonium phosphate and ammonium polyphosphate, all of which are toxic, effecting the lives of fishes, birds, animals and possibly humans due to high potential of their dispersion into lakes, rivers, and streams which may be part of the public drinking water system. Attendant to their use, effective and efficient monitoring system must be in place to assure the public that levels of safety and acceptability in drinking water are not exceeded. Also, cultivation of land areas may be delayed due to the presence of such resulting from the application of these fire retardants. Such fire retardant compositions are harmful to the environment, causing pollution of streams, and fail to significantly help in reforestation or ground cover growth to minimize future erosion of burned areas upon receiving rainfall. It would be desirable to provide an air-droppable wildfire suppressant which is effective and similar in viscosity to the present gum thickened high viscosity fire retardants resulting in desirable air-drop characteristics and the coating and insulating various fuel materials to keep them from reaching their ignition temperature. It would further be desirable to provide a fire retardant which does not require the mixing of chemicals potentially harmful to personnel and equipment. This would include the absence of toxic or hazardous chemical vapors from the fire retardant in contact with heat from flames, producing a hazardous environment for fire fighting personnel. It would further be desirable that the use of the fire retardant avoids toxic effects on wildlife and pollution of streams, and is beneficial to the environment in retaining water from subsequent rain, encouraging re-growth of ground cover and forests, minimizing erosion of burned areas. It would be further desirable if the wildfire retardant were nontoxic so as to allow immediate cultivation of burned land, thus avoiding erosion. None of the above-mentioned presently used fire retardant compositions, taken either singly or in combination, is seen to describe the instant invention as claimed. Thus, a water enhancement fire retardant solving the aforementioned problems is desired.